The Little Mer-Meta
by xXxAngelStormxXx
Summary: Themed and inspired by Disney's The Little Mermaid, with Laurel Lance as the main character.
1. Laurel

The sunlight glittered enticingly on the water's surface above as I explored the semi-destroyed ship. Ever since my little sister Sara disappeared I had become very interested in the world above, solely because Sara herself had been so enamored with it. She had been a romantic at heart, and claimed she had seen a human so beautiful it was impossible not to fall in love on one of the trips she had taken to the surface without me by her side. Of course, she never elaborated much, what with how closely our father tried to monitor us, keep up away from the surface people and their world. Yet, I could see how deeply my dear little sister was affected by this moment she had, and how happy she was just with the notion.

Something flashes in the corner of my eyes, and I swim closer to see what it is. A smile formed on my face as I gingerly picked up a small, delicate charm between my fingertips. It was a bird, and while I don't know what kind of bird it is, I imagine it could be a canary, like the ones Sarah told me she had seen. How she knew what it was called I'll never know, but I believed her. I had no reason not to. Sadly, I tucked it away in my small bag, deciding to head back to the castle already.

As I swim, my tail swishing through the water, I remember back to when Sara had soley decided to call my special power the Canary Cry. She was absolutely fascinated with this particular bird, and thought it was the perfect name for my powerful scream. Some mermaids have special abilities, and mine happens to be related to my voice.

So, lost in the memory I did not truly watch where I was going and swam right into someone. I let out a small noise of surprise as I flung myself backwards and away from the person. Blinking rapidly, I let out a small sigh of relief, "Roy. I'm sorry, I didn't see you there."

"It's a good thing you ran into me and not someone else. You know your father doesn't like you to leave the castle without any guards." He reminds me, a small smile on his lips. "We'll pretend I was with you, same as always." He reassures me before I can even ask. "Thank you, Roy. It really means a lot to me, just to have a little time to myself outside the confines of my room and the castle."

"I know. Just, please don't do anything dangerous, cause if you do then it's my head on the line too. At least take me with you if you, especially if you go to the surface." He doesn't plead, just makes a request. In my eyes he is my equal, I always try to treat him as such and encourage him to do the same with me when we are by ourselves away from scrutiny and judgement. It is not as often looked well upon when a guard, or anyone not royalty, to be friends and informal with the princess. It's unfortunate, Roy is a great friend to me and I want the opportunity to know more of my future subjects better.

"Sure." I agree, I would hate for him to be in trouble on my account. "Let's go." I swim around him, urging him to follow. Smirking with mischief, "Race you." I call as I speed ahead of him.


	2. Restrictions

I manage to beat Roy back, and our story manages to appease the other guards. My father and mother? That's a different story. My mother and father both are angry, somehow managing to know I had snuck past and Roy had managed to find me.

"How can you be so reckless Laurel?" my father, King Quentin throws his hands up in the air, exasperated. "You know it's dangerous for you to go out on your own, especially as the Crown Princess of Atlantis."

"We've already lost Sara, we don't want to lose you too Laurel." My mother, Queen Dinah, chimes in, a fierce sense of determination in her eyes. "Your father and I have agreed, you shall have guards stationed with you at all times effective immediately. Your handmaidens will be replaced with female members of the guard, and shall be with you always, or at least until you understand the gravity of your actions."

"But mother- father-"I begin to protest, but they shoot me down. "Roy will stay in your detail, he knows you well. But not alone, you need to be kept safe." My father says, getting off his throne and moving towards me, "Understand Laurel, we only want what's best for you, to keep you safe."

"What's best for me? Keep me safe?" I scoff, "You think forcing me to stay hidden from the world is what's best for me? That the only way to keep me safe is to lock me up in my own home?" I shake my head, "How is that fair?"

"It's not. But we're your parents, and if this is the only way to keep you safe, then so be it. It doesn't have to be fair."

I clench my hands into fists, fighting the urge to cry and yell and scream the unfairness of it all at them. "You never would have done this if Sara hadn't disappeared." I spit out the words, turning and swimming out of the throne room with Roy right behind me, the echoes of my parents calling my name follow us.

I swim until I feel like I can swim no more, finding myself out at my sister's old secret cave. It contains many items from the land above, the people above. It is surrounded by many other caves, and unless you knew where to go, you didn't even realize there was a cave in this particular rock formation.

I let out an annoyed huff as I sit on the life-sized statue in the middle of the area. I remember, before she disappeared a few years ago, we found this and Roy helped us bring it here. After all, nobody else would want it and it was lost to the land people in the middle of our sea anyways. Sara and I had both thought the statue had a handsome face, and joked around, pretending to know him and making up stories.

"I know you're frustrated, but you can't just swim off like that anymore. You heard them, they're really serious this time." Roy shakes his head as leans against a wall of stone. "They're just worried, you remember what happened to your sister." His tail flicks in the water as he brings up the touchy subject.

"I know." I sigh, and I'm glad that I can talk to him. Looking down to my lap, twisting my hands around, I continue, "It's just, they've always put more restrictions on me, never on Sara, the little baby of the family, the perfect little angel that she was." My shoulders droop as I remember, "I miss her."

"I know. We all do." He comforts me, hand softly on my shoulder before offering a hug, which I gladly accept.

We sit for a while, just taking a break to renew all the energy I had spent angrily swimming away before trying to head back. "I guess we had better get going." I sigh, squeezing back out of the cave with Roy. Looking up to the surface I see colors reflected, colors that I haven't seen up there before. "I wonder what's going on up there." I murmur to myself, automatically moving towards it.

"Hey, no." Roy grabs my arm, "We have to go back."

"Relax Roy, I just want to take a quick look. I promise I'll be careful." I tell him, "Come with me if you're so worried." I tease, pulling him along. At the surface, we see a large ship and it is from there that the lights are coming from. In fact, they are firing something into the sky, and colors explode with loud booms which cause me to flinch back before I allow myself to take in the lights. "Oh, wow." I breathe, "I want to take a closer look."

I swim forward before Roy can stop me, and I hear him call out in a huff "You're going to get yourself in trouble. And me too." Easily I manage to get myself up by the top of the ship, my upper body strength coming in handy to haul myself up the side. I sit on one of the ledges I used to get here, looking between the rails and at the people moving about


	3. Overboard

Everyone is wearing masks, some that cover only the area around their eyes and some that cover large portions of their faces. Upbeat music flows through the air, musicians enthusiastically playing their unique instruments. As I observe the humans, my eyes land on a tall man with short, shoulder-length, blonde hair. He is talking to a woman who is shorter than he is, with long curly brown hair. They smile as they laugh, and I wonder what they were speaking of to seem so happy, so care-free. The pair twirled around, weaving between the other dancing people with expertise, their movements full of grace. Finally, they were close enough that I could hear their laughs, and immediately I decided that I quite liked the sound of his. An emotion I couldn't identify caused my heart to flutter.

Suddenly water droplets landed on my cheek, and I was broken out of my thoughts. With a frown, I looked around to see the sky was darkening, fast. The waves, now below us, began crashing against the ship harder and harder as the wind picked up more and the already dark sky seemed to darken even more until it appeared almost black to me. I look to see Roy below at the top of the water, his eyes on me. "I suppose we had better go." I sigh softly to myself.

Looking back, I am caught at the sound of the man's laugher, and for a moment I contemplate staying just a little longer but suddenly the ship rocks and I am forced to dive down to the water. I land next to Roy, quickly we swim, getting away from the unpredictable ship's movements. We watch from a distance as it rocks back and forth dangerously, and suddenly there is someone falling overboard. I let out a gasp, my hands covering my mouth as I watched intently.

"Roy, we have to help!" I dive forward and swim frantically to reach them, Roy trying to follow, but I lose him in the wreckage falling from above. When I reach the shadowy person, I realize it is the same man who was laughing before. Remembering that humans cannot breathe underwater, I pull him towards the surface with all my strength and manage to get him to shore.

With the help of the tide pushing against the sand, I manage to lay him out on the beach, checking for heartbeats and signs of life. I breathe a sigh of relief when I find his heartbeat is steadying out and he is breathing softly.

I nod to myself, my shoulders relaxing. The sun begins to rise and I am struck by the beauty of it. It was a sight I had only seen a few times before, when Sara was still with us. The sunrise.

A soft smile on my lips I begin to softly sing a lullaby that my sister had loved growing up. She would have loved to see the colors and brightness of the early morning in the air and glinting off the top of the water.

Slowly the man opens his eyes just the smallest bit and I am pleasantly surprised by how blue they are. He groans and squeezes his eyes shut again. "What happened?" his voice is hoarse as he asks the question. Startled, I slide back into the water and pull myself up, propping myself up on an angled rock, leaning on my forearms. One of the rules of our people is to not be seen by the people who walk the land, and I both figure since mer-people look like them from the waist up that they won't notice if it's obscured.

"You were thrown from your ship." I speak softly, "I pulled you from the water." I bite my lip, nervous. Immediately he shoots up, holding his head and forcing his eyes open, "Althea?!" he gasps out, but before he can do anything else we hear shouts, people looking for him I suppose.

"I'm here!" He coughs out, before repeating the call louder, turning towards the sounds as he shouts. "I'm here!" Quickly, I dive back into the water, knowing it would be trouble for anyone else to see me.

Safe from view I watch as more people come to help and wrap him up in fine blankets.

Once they are out of view I fall back under the water, knowing it was past time for me to find Roy and return to the palace.


	4. Back to the Castle

I arrive back to the edge of Atlantis just in time to see the Royal guard dispersing from the castle, and it is clear to me that they are searching for me. Exhausted I maneuver through the buildings, rock formation, and vegetation, trying to get to the castle to save them all from going too far. Getting to the ornate entryway, I push the heavy doors with a soft groan.

The exhaustion is too much, and I find myself collapsing onto a lounge on my way to the throne room. Taking a moment to catch my breath before forcing myself to keep going, my eyes slowly droop shut and the exhaustion pulls me into a light slumber.

* * *

The next thing I know I am being moved through the water, carried by someone. My head leaning onto their shoulder, I wearily peer through my eyelashes and see Roy's face. Of course, who else would it be? "Roy?" My voice sounds raspy to me and I try to clear my throat.

"I've got you Laurel."  
"Are you all right?" I manage, "I lost you in the storm." The lights and sounds flash through my memory, thunder cracking as the rain pelted the sea and anything else in its path.

"I'm fine." He assures me, "Was more worried about you." He admits, "I'm glad you made it back, you're safe now." He sets me down on my plush bed, and I fall back against the pillows. "I've called for on of your new handmaidens to bring some food and drink from the chef. You're going to want to eat something."

"Thank you." I like I'm sinking into the mattress and my tail-fins twitch, too sore to really move. My eyes still feel droopy, and my vision fades in and out. I know I'm going to pass out again, so I tell him one last thing, "You're a good friend Roy. I'm glad you're in my life."

"Me too." The last thing I see is his soft smile fade to shock as muted yells meet my ears and I hear the door open, my parents coming in. Then I'm out.


End file.
